On 16 April 2018 it was reported that the 'gay conversion therapy' motion along with those other nasty motions were removed from the agenda for the Liberal's annual state council meeting - apparently the party's state president didn't like the negative publicity these motions was gathering ahead of the November 2018 Victorian state election.
Wednesday 18 April 2018
Liberals continue to behave badly in 2018 - Part Four
Just five months
after Australian voters signalled their widespread acceptance of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and
Intersex (LGBTI) members of the community by voting for
the introduction of same sex marriage, a number people in the Victorian Liberal Party want to turn
back the clock in the name of sheer bigotry.
The
Age, 14 April
2018:
A motion by a conservative
Liberal branch linked to Federal MP Kevin Andrews has called for state
legislation allowing health practitioners “to offer counselling out of same sex
attraction or gender transitioning to patients who request it''.
With seven months before
the Victorian election, it also urges Mr Guy to advocate for laws ensuring
“parents and young people are all given full information about the
psychological harms of social, medical and surgical gender transitioning”.
It further states that
any claims supporting prescribing puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and
gender re-assignment surgery as safe and reversible, are in fact "both
false and harmful".
The motion was drafted
by the Victorian Liberal Party’s Menzies-Warrandyte branch and will be one of
dozens debated when rank-and-file delegates meet on April 28 and 29 for the
party’s annual state council meeting….
Other motions to be
debated at state council include:
* Calls for the
Commonwealth Sex Discrimination Act to re-insert "man" and
"woman" in the place of "sexual orientation" and
"gender identity". The aim is that a person will define their gender
as either male or female, according to their biological and reproductive
function.
* Calls to ban the Safe
Schools program from Victorian schools and any other curriculum teaching a
person's gender may be different from their biological sex or that people can
transition.
On 16 April 2018 it was reported that the 'gay conversion therapy' motion along with those other nasty motions were removed from the agenda for the Liberal's annual state council meeting - apparently the party's state president didn't like the negative publicity these motions was gathering ahead of the November 2018 Victorian state election.
On 16 April 2018 it was reported that the 'gay conversion therapy' motion along with those other nasty motions were removed from the agenda for the Liberal's annual state council meeting - apparently the party's state president didn't like the negative publicity these motions was gathering ahead of the November 2018 Victorian state election.
Labels:
bigotry,
discrimination,
human rights
Tuesday 17 April 2018
More reports showing that 'trickle up' economics is at work in Australia
Here is just a little of what Liberal & National party members - and their governments - refuse to understand as they support a far-right economic platform which is built on a reduction in corporate tax rates, high business profits and large management salaries in conjunction with employee wage supression, erosion of workers' rights, an increase in employment insecurity based on casual, part-time and/or employees as sham contractors and, further restrictions on eligibility for a number of basic welfare payments.
The
Sydney Morning Herald,
10 April 2018:
Last year, as the
government prepared another round of welfare crackdowns, Minister Michaelia
Cash said she expects “that those who can work should work and our welfare
system should be there as a genuine safety net, not as something that people
can choose to fund their lifestyle.”
The subtext was clear –
those who need help are a drain on the rest of us.
This rhetoric is
familiar, but it is wrong. It is the wealthiest Australians who enjoy the most
support.
Research commissioned by
Anglicare Australia shows that each year, a staggering $68 billion is spent
keeping the wealthiest households wealthy. That is greater than the cost of
Newstart, disability support, the age pension, or any other single welfare group.
The Cost of Privilege
report, prepared by Per Capita, models four household types to show how these
concessions and tax breaks work. One of the couples we modelled, Tim and
Michelle, own their own home. They have two children in private schools, top
health insurance, and two investment properties. Michelle doesn’t work, and Tim
runs a small business. Each year, Tim and Michelle get $99,708 in concessions
from the taxpayer, or $1917 per week. That is well over twice as much as a
couple with two children on Newstart, and nearly three times as much as a
family with one parent on the Disability Support Pension. Tim and Michelle do
this by getting concessions on their superannuation, negatively gearing their
investment properties to minimise their taxable income, and getting tax breaks
for private schools and private health insurance. They also get generous
Capital Gains Tax exemptions.
Each year, thousands of
Australia's wealthiest households profit from these loopholes and subsidies.
Our report finds that tax exemptions on private healthcare and education for
the wealthiest 20 per cent cost more than $3 billion a year.
Superannuation
concessions to them cost over $20 billion a year, and their Capital Gains Tax
exemptions cost an astonishing $40 billion a year. Compare that to the annual
cost of Newstart, which comes in at just under $11 billion a year.
Importantly, nothing
that Tim and Michelle are doing is wrong or illegal. This is not a broken
system. It is a system working exactly the way it was designed to work,
supporting the wealthiest at the expense of the rest of us.
These numbers tell us
that something has gone badly wrong. The eighties were the decade of
trickle-down economics, where taxes were cut for the richest with the promise
that everyone else would soon feel the benefits. But now it’s worse – we’re in
an era of trickle-up economics where subsidies, tax breaks and concessions for
the richest are paid for by everyone else.....
Anglicare Australia, 26 March 2018:
Cost of Privilege Report (.pdf)
Cost of Privilege - overview (.pdf)
Cost of Privilege - households (.pdf)
ABC
News, 15
April 2018:
One in every five
Australian children has gone hungry in the past 12 months according to a new
report, with some even resorting to chewing paper to try to feel full.
The survey of 1,000
parents commissioned by Foodbank shows 22 per cent of Australian children under
the age of 15 live in a household that has ran out of food at some stage over
the past year.
One in five kids
affected go to school without eating breakfast at least once a week, while one
in 10 go a whole day at least once a week without eating anything at all.
"I think that's a
very sad indictment on us as a society," said Foodbank Victoria chief
executive Dave McNamara…..
"Some kids were eating paper. Their parents had told them
'There's not enough food, if you get hungry you'll need to chew paper.'"
"This isn't made
up. This is a story we heard setting up one of our school breakfast programs
down in Lakes Entrance, which is a beautiful part of the country."
"No-one's spared.
It's not people on the street; it's people in your street. It's in every
community across Australia."
Foodbank Victoria graphic below based on its Rumbling Tummies Report, April 2018:
Fair Work Ombudsman begins another weary audit which will inevitably discover more employers behaving like criminals
Despite wage growth falling to record lows last year, the Australian Minister for Jobs and Innovation WA Liberal Senator Michaelia Cash continues to talk down any need for a substantial national minimum wage increase and praises the good will of employers big and small.
It seems she just refuses to accpet the evidence of her own eyes.......
The Guardian, 11 April 2018:
On Wednesday the Fair
Work Ombudsman announced an audit targeting the fast food, restaurant and cafe
sector which will penalise businesses exploiting vulnerable workers, including
students, casual staff and immigrants.
It follows numerous
high-profile cases of workers being exploited, including a cook who was
employed by Bar Coluzzi in Sydney on a 457 skilled worker visa who was told by
her boss to repay $13,952 of her wages to cover tax and superannuation
contributions. She was also working excessive unpaid overtime.
The convenience story
chain 7-Eleven was found
by a Senate inquiry to have been forcing workers to go to ATMs to
withdraw and pay back wages. The panel investigating 7-Eleven told the inquiry
it had made 188 determinations that 7-Eleven was liable to pay workers a total
of $4.36m, with workers being underpaid an average of $23,000 each.
A Fair Work Ombudsman
spokesman told Guardian Australia that intelligence from a range of sources
found failing to pay the correct hourly base, penalty and overtime rates, and
ignoring record-keeping and payslip requirements were consistent issues.
In 2016–17, 44% of the
hospitality workers assisted by the ombudsman to resolve workplace disputes
were aged under 26, and 31% were visa holders. Despite the hospitality industry
employing around 7% of Australia’s workforce, it accounted for the highest
number (17%) of disputes. It was also the industry with the highest number of
anonymous reports received (36%), infringement notices issued (39%) and court
actions commenced (27%).
While workers under the
age of 25 account for about 15% of the Australian working population, they were
involved in 28% of workplace disputes the ombudsman took on in 2017. Migrant
workers make up 6% of the Australian workforce, however 18% of workplace
disputes involved a visa holder.
The ombudsman has begun
auditing 1,000 businesses across the country and investigators will check the
time and wage records of randomly selected businesses, especially those
employing a large numbers of vulnerable workers. Companies involved in serious
contraventions will face penalties of up to $630,000 per contravention. The
maximum penalty for individuals is now $126,000 per contravention. Failing to
keep employee records or issue pay slips attracts a penalty up to $63,000 for a
company and $12,600 for an individual.
Labels:
Australian society,
exploitation,
Fair Work Commission,
jobs,
wages
Monday 16 April 2018
Yamba basks in the reflected glow of gold
Area
News, 14
April 2018:
Cousins
Donna Urquhart (right) and Cameron Pilley have won gold in the mixed doubles
squash.
They already shared
family, a hometown and their childhoods - but now cousins Donna Urquhart and
Cameron Pilley share a mixed doubles squash title at the Commonwealth Games.
Urquhart and Pilley won gold
after defeating Indian pair Dipika Pallikal Karthik and Saurav Ghosal on the
Gold Coast on Saturday.
Both a product of Yamba
in northern NSW, the Australian duo grew up together but only began dreaming of
sharing a home gold after competing as a doubles pairing last year.
"I watched Cameron
become a professional player while I was still at school but I knew that's what
I wanted to do from seeing him do it," a speechless Urquhart said.
"It wasn't until
later on that we ended up playing together, but it's worked out alright."
Dozens of friends and
family had travelled up for the Games, while Pilley also had a group of ten
in-laws fly all the way from his wife's home in Denmark as part of a capacity
Oxenford Studios crowd.
It is the third
Commonwealth gold of his career, having won doubles in Delhi and Glasgow.
"Every other gold
I've won is so special but to play in front of such a great Aussie crowd, we
never get the opportunity to," Pilley said.
"To do it in front
of friends and family that never get to see you play, and we walk away with a
gold medal, it makes it even better.".....
Labels:
Commonwealth Games,
gold medals,
sport
In Febuary-March 2018 there were 63 Notifiable Data Breaches in Australia involving the personal information of up to 341,849 individuals
In the 2016–17 financial year, the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) reported that it received 114 data breach notifications on a voluntary basis.
On 22
February the Notifiable Data Breaches (NDB) scheme came into force.
Between 22
February and 31 March 2018 there were 63 mandatory notifiable data breaches reported involving the personal information of up to est. 341,849 individuals, with 55 of these breaches reported in March alone.
Of these breaches:
24 were
the result of criminal or malicious attack;
32 were
the result of human error;
2 were
system fault; and
1 was
classified as “Other”.
The type of personal information involved in the data breaches:
The type of personal information involved in the data breaches:
Three of
these data breaches involved the personal information of between 10,000 and 999,999 people in each instance.
At least
15 of the 63 data breached involved personal information held by “health service providers”. Health service providers are considered to be any organisation that provides a health service and holds health
information.
Every individual whose personal information was breached was supposed to be notified by the entity holding their information, however the OAIC Quarterly Statistics Report: January 2018 - March 2018 did not specifically state that this had occurred.
Every individual whose personal information was breached was supposed to be notified by the entity holding their information, however the OAIC Quarterly Statistics Report: January 2018 - March 2018 did not specifically state that this had occurred.
Labels:
big data,
data retention,
information technology,
privacy,
safety,
statistics
One of those asssociated with the company behind the second push for a Yamba Mega Port allegedly used an alias when giving sworn evidence before a NSW parliamentray committee
An open secret finally hit the headline this month......
The
Sydney Morning Herald, 12
April 2018:
Disgraced former senior
tax official Nick Petroulias gave sworn evidence to a parliamentary inquiry
under a fake name, it has been alleged in State Parliament - and seven MPs
sitting across the table never twigged.
The Greens are now
demanding a formal inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the appearance at
the inquiry into Crown land, held in August 2016.
Mr Petroulias' face was
splashed across the country's media about eight years earlier, when he was
imprisoned for corrupt conduct during his stint as assistant tax commissioner.
But in Parliament on
Thursday, Greens MP David Shoebridge alleged that Mr Petroulias used the alias
"Nicholas Peterson" to give sworn evidence before the upper house
committee, of which Mr Shoebridge was a member.
If the allegations are
proven, it will mean Mr Petroulias was able to pull the wool over the eyes of
seven politicians, including inquiry chair Paul Green of the Christian
Democrats.
Mr Shoebridge pointed
out that in his verdict handed down in 2008, Justice Peter Johnson found Mr
Petroulias had refused to acknowledge his "clear and gross
wrongdoing" and "clear impropriety and deceit".
The standing committee
was tasked with looking at a range of issues relating to Crown land in NSW,
including Aboriginal involvement in its management.
"Mr Peterson"
appeared before the committee with three other men who all identified as
members of an organisation called "United Land Councils".
The organisation, they
explained, was focused on the economic development of Aboriginal land by
linking land councils across Australia and attracting "large-scale
international and domestic investment".
Described as the
organisation's "strategy and legals executive", Mr Peterson gave
evidence about a property deal he was working up with an Aboriginal land
council near Newcastle.
The same deal was the
subject of a Fairfax Media special investigation last year. It is now being
probed by the Independent Commission Against Corruption, which has been told
that Mr Petroulias played a "central role" in the transaction.
At the inquiry, Liberal
MP Catherine Cusack questioned Mr Peterson about his relationship to the land
council, asking whether it was a "mediation role".
"Yes, we are trying
to bring them together to try to get it on a massive scale," he said.
"Could you come
back to us on notice as to which land councils in NSW are part of your
organisation?" asked Liberal MP Scott Farlow.
"Sure," Mr
Peterson replied.
The ICAC inquiry has
separately heard that Mr Petroulias has gone by several names - including
Nicholas Piers, Pearson and Peterson - since his release from prison.
Fairfax Media obtained
bankruptcy forms from 2015 in which he described himself as a "disabled
pensioner", with his debts estimated at an eye-watering $104 million.
Labels:
NSW Parliament,
United Land Councils Ltd
Sunday 15 April 2018
It is getting harder and harder to believe Facebook Inc's denials of intentional harm
The fact that Facebook Inc. re-named the street in which it is headquartered "1 Hacker Way" should have been a clue to this social media giant's business ethos but it obviously didn't register with national governments and everyday Internet users.
By the time All tech reported this on 11 November 2016 we were all a little more informed, but Facebook was still trying to pull the wool over our eyes:
Mark Zuckerberg says the
notion that fake news influenced the U.S. presidential election is "a
pretty crazy idea."
The Facebook CEO is
finding himself in a unique position in this election cycle. Many news
organizations have come under fire for their coverage of the campaign. Now
Facebook is getting it too, as a modern media company that does not vet fake
news from its News Feed and that, critics argue, allows users to stay in information
bubbles that reinforce existing prejudices.
Zuckerberg took both
these criticisms head-on yesterday, at a conference called Techonomy. (You can find the
full interview on his Facebook feed.)
He says hoaxes existed
before his platform was created. They aren't new, and people who say
misinformation is why Donald Trump won simply do not get it. "There's a
profound lack of empathy in asserting that the only reason why someone could
have voted the way that they did is because they saw some fake news,"
Zuckerberg says.
He also says his company
has studied fake news and found it's a "very small volume" of the
content on Facebook. He did not specify if that content is more or less viral
or impactful than other information.
Denials of a dangerously lax attitude to risk in Facebook Inc.'s business model continued to be made as more information surfaced......
BuzzFeed, 30 March 2018
The
Age, 31 March
2018:
In a 2016 employee memo
that was leaked this week, a Facebook executive defended the company's
questionable data mining practices and championed the growth of social media at
any cost - apparently even death.
Users in the US sue
Facebook for not protecting personal data of the 50 million social network
account owners whose data ended up at the political consulting firm Cambridge
Analytica.
"Maybe it costs a
life by exposing someone to bullies," company vice president Andrew
Bosworth wrote in the memo, according to BuzzFeed News, which published it
Thursday. "Maybe someone dies in a terrorist attack coordinated on our
tools. And still we connect people. The ugly truth is that we believe in
connecting people so deeply that anything that allows us to connect more people
more often is *de facto* good."….
Bosworth, who oversaw
Facebook's advertising and business platform at the time and is now in charge
of the company's virtual reality department, has acknowledged writing the
message but said he intended only to start a debate. "I didn't agree with
it even when I wrote it," he wrote on Twitter after BuzzFeed published its
report.
Facebook chief executive
Mark Zuckerberg, who is already facing a public relations crisis over
accusations that the company
mishandled millions of users' private data, disavowed the memo.
"Boz is a talented
leader who says many provocative things," Zuckerberg said in a statement,
using Bosworth's nickname. "This was one that most people at Facebook
including myself disagreed with strongly. We've never believed the ends justify
the means."…….
The 418-word memo is
framed around Zuckerberg's often-stated mission to connect the entire world
through Facebook, which Bosworth cites as the company's ultimate and
unchangeable goal - whether those connections let users fall in love, attack
each other or, in the memo's most extreme example, coordinate a terrorist
attack.
"That's why all the
work we do in growth is justified," Bosworth wrote. "All the
questionable contact importing practices. All the subtle language that helps
people stay searchable by friends. All of the work we do to bring more
communication in. The work we will likely have to do in China some day. All of
it."
BuzzFeed noted that the
memo was written almost immediately after a man was shot to death while
streaming live video of himself with Facebook Live, and a few days before a
Palestinian teenager was accused of killing an Israeli girl after praising
terrorists on Facebook.
These deaths were a
prelude to a string of other gruesome and violent incidents that appeared in
videos and live streams on the social network. A man posted a Facebook video of
himself killing someone last April. A month later, a man soaked himself in
kerosene, lit himself on fire and used Facebook Live to stream video of his
self-immolation.
Then we saw Zuckerberg donning a suit as he did the rounds in Washington DC. Appearing before a Joint Senate Committees on the Judiciary & Commerce, Science, and Transportation’s Facebook, Social Media Privacy, and the Use and Abuse of Data hearing and a House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee's Facebook: Transparency and Use of Consumer Data hearing.
There was an expectation that during these hearings Zuckerberg would reveal the full extent of Facebook's data collection and retention, as well as explain why he allowed third party apps to collect data without the knowledge and/or fully informed consent of up to est, 2 billion Facebook users.
His disingenuous witness statement published ahead of his appearances contains this gem:
Facebook is an idealistic and optimistic company. For most of our existence, we focused on all the good that connecting people can bring.....
Then we saw Zuckerberg donning a suit as he did the rounds in Washington DC. Appearing before a Joint Senate Committees on the Judiciary & Commerce, Science, and Transportation’s Facebook, Social Media Privacy, and the Use and Abuse of Data hearing and a House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee's Facebook: Transparency and Use of Consumer Data hearing.
There was an expectation that during these hearings Zuckerberg would reveal the full extent of Facebook's data collection and retention, as well as explain why he allowed third party apps to collect data without the knowledge and/or fully informed consent of up to est, 2 billion Facebook users.
His disingenuous witness statement published ahead of his appearances contains this gem:
Facebook is an idealistic and optimistic company. For most of our existence, we focused on all the good that connecting people can bring.....
But it’s clear now that
we didn’t do enough to prevent these tools from being used for harm as well.
That goes for fake news, foreign interference in elections, and hate speech, as
well as developers and data privacy. We didn’t take a broad enough view of our
responsibility, and that was a big mistake. It was my mistake, and I’m sorry. I
started Facebook, I run it, and I’m responsible for what happens here. So now
we have to go through every part of our relationship with people and make sure
we’re taking a broad enough view of our responsibility.
However, if one reads through the full witness statement it is clear that Facebook Inc. is not responding out of a genuine realisation of its ethical failures or wrongdoing, but is essentially responding to the sharp fall in its stock value which began last month.
It clearly intends to still allow third party apps access to Facebook user accounts and there is no guarantee that the amount of personal data that can be extracted by these apps will be limited to a digital version of 'name, rank and serial number' or that Facebook users will have given fully-informed consent for this data extraction.
This reading of Facebook Inc.'s intentions was reinforced by Mark Zuckerberg testimony before both the Senate and House committees.
He came obviously rehearsed by lawyers and tightly scripted......
Although in his spoken testimony Zuckerberg commenced with yet another apology, in my opinion he frequently dissembled, mislead, misdirected, contradicted a number of his own and Facebook management's public previous statements, lied by omission and sometimes almost defiantly told what appeared to be bald-faced lies.
NOTE: Readers can form their own opinion of Zuckerberg's testimony courtesy of The Washington Post at https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2018/04/10/transcript-of-mark-zuckerbergs-senate-hearing/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.032d3cf2a0e8
& https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2018/04/11/transcript-of-zuckerbergs-appearance-before-house-committee/?utm_term=.cd5f1228fec4.
However Facebook Inc. is not just relying on its founder and CEO's recent testimony to ward of further regulation of its businss practices.
Since 2011 Facebook Inc. has had a registered Political Action Commttee (PAC) which has donated to the 2012, 2014, and 2016 US election campaigns.
As well as in-house and paid lobbyists who spent in total US$11.5 million in 2017 alone fighting against further Internet regulations including any proposed strengthening of privacy protections. Add that to the company's US$8.6M lobbying spend in 2016, $9.8M in 2015, $9.3M in 2014, $6.4M in 2013, $3.8M in 2012, $1.3M in 2011, $351,390 in 2010 and $207,878 in 2009 and one can see that Facebook Inc. is increasingly determined to have the ear of US lawmakers.
Although how successful the social media giant's lobbying efforts on Capitol Hill will be in 2018, it is clear that in has been partially successful in protecting the market value of its shares.
To date this year Facebook Inc.'s ordinary share price has gone from a closing high of US$193.09 (01.02.18) to a low of $152.22 (27.03.18) in the wake of revelations about the company's business practices and, then gradually climbed over the course of 17 days by $12.3 to close at $164.52 (13.03.18), according to Yahoo! Finance.
As for the number of active Facebook users - only time will tell if current figures hold over time. With trust in Facebook Inc. at a new low it will not be surprising to find the number of accounts showing daily activity falling over time as users become more wary of this platform.
This reading of Facebook Inc.'s intentions was reinforced by Mark Zuckerberg testimony before both the Senate and House committees.
He came obviously rehearsed by lawyers and tightly scripted......
Time Magazine, Facebook aide closing notes during hearing recess,11 April 2018
Brief summary of Mark Zuckerber notes here.
Although in his spoken testimony Zuckerberg commenced with yet another apology, in my opinion he frequently dissembled, mislead, misdirected, contradicted a number of his own and Facebook management's public previous statements, lied by omission and sometimes almost defiantly told what appeared to be bald-faced lies.
NOTE: Readers can form their own opinion of Zuckerberg's testimony courtesy of The Washington Post at https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2018/04/10/transcript-of-mark-zuckerbergs-senate-hearing/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.032d3cf2a0e8
& https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2018/04/11/transcript-of-zuckerbergs-appearance-before-house-committee/?utm_term=.cd5f1228fec4.
However Facebook Inc. is not just relying on its founder and CEO's recent testimony to ward of further regulation of its businss practices.
Since 2011 Facebook Inc. has had a registered Political Action Commttee (PAC) which has donated to the 2012, 2014, and 2016 US election campaigns.
As well as in-house and paid lobbyists who spent in total US$11.5 million in 2017 alone fighting against further Internet regulations including any proposed strengthening of privacy protections. Add that to the company's US$8.6M lobbying spend in 2016, $9.8M in 2015, $9.3M in 2014, $6.4M in 2013, $3.8M in 2012, $1.3M in 2011, $351,390 in 2010 and $207,878 in 2009 and one can see that Facebook Inc. is increasingly determined to have the ear of US lawmakers.
Although how successful the social media giant's lobbying efforts on Capitol Hill will be in 2018, it is clear that in has been partially successful in protecting the market value of its shares.
To date this year Facebook Inc.'s ordinary share price has gone from a closing high of US$193.09 (01.02.18) to a low of $152.22 (27.03.18) in the wake of revelations about the company's business practices and, then gradually climbed over the course of 17 days by $12.3 to close at $164.52 (13.03.18), according to Yahoo! Finance.
As for the number of active Facebook users - only time will tell if current figures hold over time. With trust in Facebook Inc. at a new low it will not be surprising to find the number of accounts showing daily activity falling over time as users become more wary of this platform.
Labels:
Facebook,
information technology,
privacy,
risk,
safety
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